Camping For Their Lives Analysis

Scott Bransford uses his piece “Camping for Their Lives” to discuss the growing number of ‘tent cities’, or small ramshackle communities of homeless people, in the western portion of America (McWhorter, 2015, 385). Bransford opens with a picture painted scene of Taco Flat, a tent city located near Fresno, and anecdotes from its residents to guide the audience into the reasons behind said cities. Bransford appears to subscribe to the quote from Larry Haynes found in the article that states: what this speaks of is an absolute crisis of affordability and accessibility (McWhorter, 2015, 387). The author follows this logic by presenting interviews with tent city residents, making international parallels, including the incite of multiple ‘experts’, …show more content…
Though he appears to have a one track mentality with causes of homelessness, Bransford goes into detail about rising poverty and crime rates in areas where tent cities are popping up; stating that in Fresno there is a growing gap between the rich and poor and that 41% of homeless people have been incarcerated (McWhorter, 2015, 388). The author holds fast to these proven links to homelessness, and considering poverty is the reason he uses for the basis of his previously mentioned argument he goes into depth analysing the strong correlation between poverty and lack of proper housing. But the wealth gap in Fresno cannot compete with Mumbai. Bransford brings in urban studies professor Rahul Mehrotra to draw parallels between the slums of Mumbai and the tent cities of western America (McWhorter, 2015, 388). Mehrotra states that these conditions are a result of the government’s inability to provide housing affordably across society (McWhorter, 2015, 388). This source allows the audience to understand that this isn’t a new occurrence in the world and puts into perspective that this isn’t a problem with one government or environment. This is a wider spread problem than previously displayed in the article. Bransford even goes further by drawing references from American history; comparing Taco Flat to Hooversville, a tent city in the Great Depression (McWhorter, 2015, 386), and including an anecdote from a resident of Taco Flat, Frankie Lynch, recalling the similarities between his living situation now and the Lynch family’s living situation during the Dust Bowl (McWhorter, 2015, 387). These details go towards showing that tent cities are not a new problem, not in the world and not even in American